BILLINGS - A Pryor Creek rancher said he didn't shoot bigfoot this summer.

Contrary to widely
circulating rumors, Steve Kukowski said no bipedal primate ever terrorized
his livestock, was killed by his bullet or was taken away by federal agents.

"The rumors have
been going around all summer," Kukowski said. "I have no idea
what it is. I have no idea how it got started."

The sasquatch story
has persisted for three months, but there are many different versions.
Rudy Drobnick, a retired wildlife biologist with the Utah Department of
Natural Resources, has been tracking the tales. Drobnick tracks bigfoot
sightings across the nation.

"The reports
range from an enlarged black widow spider to a giant mouse to a blown
up tire on the road," Drobnick said in a telephone interview from
his office in Salt Lake City. "I have no details on any aspect of
it other than a bigfoot had been killed, shot or maybe hit on the road
somewhere near Billings."

Given the three-month
life span of the rumor and the emergence of common themes, Drobnick believes
further investigation is needed. "At this point in time, based on
my information, the thing is to be pursued as if it was a real creature," he said.

In most of the stories,
the sighting occurred on the Crow Reservation, the beast was black and
hairy and its corpse was zipped into a body bag and whisked away by federal
agents minutes before local authorities could investigate.

Dexter Fallsdown,
director of public safety for the Crow Tribe, described what he has heard: "A bigfoot got killed, some people came and picked him up and took
him away."

Fallsdown said there
has never been substantiating evidence.

"We tried to
do a follow-up on him, but all of the sudden it was hush-hush," he
said. "I think it's just the rumor mill."

Federal and state
agents claim no knowledge of a missing link dwelling near Pryor, about
40 miles south of Billings.

"That's the first
I heard of it," he said. "I can assure you that we are not doing
anything covertly to hide a body. I do not have a bigfoot in my evidence
locker."

Vierthaler said he
was pleased to be asked about something other than anthrax.

"This could be
the next episode of the 'X Files'," he joked, referring to the popular
Fox Television show about two FBI agents who investigate the paranormal,
including space aliens, vampires and wildly inbred families.

Denials are to be
expected from federal agents, Drobnick said. "If there's a dead one,
like they said, you wouldn't be able to get anything out of them if you
pried it with a crowbar."

If a sasquatch community
exists in Yellowstone or Bighorn counties, FWP would be interested in
learning more, Pryor said.

"Depending on
the size of the population, there's a chance we could trap, tag and redistribute
some in other parts of the state," he said. "You know our routine
on anything other than humans - try to build them up to huntable populations
and start issuing tags."

Drobnick said he and
a group of friends have recorded about 100 possible bigfoot sightings
during the last 20 years. During hunting season, when Drobnick measures
trophy big-game animals for the Boone and Crockett Club, he asks hunters
if they spotted any unusual wildlife.

Most people say no,
but there have been credible reports of sightings, Drobnick said.

"There have been
at least two cases I have investigated here where people have had bigfoots
in front of their cars," he said.

In 1976, a hunter
driving on a snowy mountain road south of Salt Lake City had to stop his
pickup to allow a bigfoot to cross the road. Another hunter briefly spotted
a bigfoot in his truck's headlights in the same area.

Drobnick also heard
from a man who spotted bigfoot while driving along a dirt road in Arizona
in a tractor-trailer. The driver had to lock his brakes to avoid hitting
the beast.

"When people
continue to bring in reports that they have seen this tall, black, hairy
creature when they have been out in the hills, they must have seen something,"
Drobnick said. "There have been hoaxes, admittedly. "

Reports of sasquatch
have been around for 200 years, he said. "That's a pretty long time
to continue a hoax," he said. "It's also a rather hazardous
hoax to put on a black suit with hair during archery season for elk and
deer."

Along with the bigfoot
in Crow Country, there was also a report of a black and hairy creature
spotted by Boy Scouts in the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming on July 25,
Drobnick said.

Drobnick said he has
never seen physical evidence of a bigfoot - and he is yet to be fully
convinced of its existence - but he believes the possibility is worth
investigating. In a 1997 report, Drobnick said the planet is 5 billion
years old and has "supported many forms of life much more bizarre
than the reported bigfoot...."

At the end of the
report, Drobnick urges states to pass laws protecting possible bigfoot
populations "in order to ensure their safety throughout the coming
years."

David Turns Plenty
Sr., a minister and Pryor's elected representative to the Crow Tribe's
executive committee, said the bigfoot stories continue to circulate in
his community.

"There's different
stories, but the one I heard was this one rancher had shot it when he
saw it amongst his cattle," Turns Plenty said. "They say they
took the thing to Bozeman, then I heard again that they took it out of
state. A lot of people say it's for it real. I don't know."

Although no evidence
supports the existence of a Pryor ape man, Drobnick said he will keep
an open mind and continue searching for proof of the elusive species.

"We'll certainly
keep attempting to get to the bottom of this mystery," he said. "If
this thing is a hoax, then there's thousands of people being fooled by
it. If it's real, we're just being eluded."

Story originally
published by the
Billings Gazette via Missoulian, Missoula, Montana
James Hagengruber - Oct
29.01